Skip to main content

Man Set To Be First Black African In Space Killed In Motorbike Accident.


A South African man who won the chance to be the first black African in space has died in a motorbike crash before turning his dream into reality, his family announced on Sunday.

Mandla Maseko, a part-time DJ, and candidate officer with the South African Air Force, was nicknamed “Afronaut” after landing a coveted seat to fly 103-kilometers (64 miles) into space in 2013 in a competition organised by a US-based space academy.

He died in a motorcycle accident on Saturday, according to a family statement cited by local media.

The 30-year-old had beaten a million other entrants from 75 countries to be selected as one of 23 people who would travel on an hour-long sub-orbital trip on the Lynx Mark II spaceship.

Born to a school cleaner and auto tool maker in Soshanguve township near Pretoria, his win was a source of national pride and had neighbours high-fiving him for putting South Africa’s townships on the “galactic map”.

He spent a week at the Kennedy Space Academy in Florida where he skydived and undertook air combat and G-force training.

While there he met and posed for pictures with US astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who was the second man ever to set foot on the moon after Neil Armstrong as part of the 1969 Apollo 11 space mission.

He had been originally scheduled to fly in 2015 but no firm plans for his trip had been made public at the time of his death.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Instagram Star Brutally Murdered By 4chan Member.

An Instagram star was brutally murdered by a 4chan member who nearly decapitated her then posted gruesome photos of her body online. 17-year-old Bianca Devins from Utica, NY was brutally murdered on Sunday, July 14, by Brandon Clark, 21. He then posted grisly photos of her body to Instagram, 4Chan and the gaming website, Discord. Clark spent time photographing and recording the body. In one image her body is covered with a green tarp. He captioned the photos, "Sorry f----rs, you're gonna have to find some else to orbit," which is a term for men who lurk on a girl's social media page hoping for a hookup. In another photo of her bloody left arm, he wrote, "I'm sorry Bianca.” The bloody knife is seen on the passenger seat next to Devins' body. Instagram followers recognized the teenager from the photos and geolocated Clark using the metadata in the photos. Police received calls around 7:20 a.m., including a call from Clark himself. Police qui

Say 'Hello' To Armless Bae, The New Queen Of Social Media!

Guyssssss!A new model is trending on social media. Her name is Ashley and in addition to modeling on Instagram, she’s also a student at North Carolina A&T. She's hot gorgeous, no doubt. BUT Ashley has an unusual feature – she was only born with one arm. But instead of that being a HANDICAP . .. it’s actually made her a lot more interesting. Here are her pics . . .

Alexa Bliss Pulled From WWE Evolution, New Tag Team Partner Revealed.

Alexa Bliss will not be competing at Sunday's Evolution pay-per-view. Bliss suffered a concussion or a broken nose at last Saturday's live event and she has been out of action since. Alicia Fox will be replacing Bliss in the match with Mickie James against WWE Hall of Famers Lita and Trish Stratus. Bliss will be in their corner.